Blockchain-Based Journalism Platform Civil Launches

Blockchain media startup Civil has launched despite an ill-fated token sale late last year

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Blockchain-based journalism network Civil has announced its launch in an official blog post on March 1.

Civil is a platform for independent journalism that aims to develop an alternative model to support journalism. The project’s ecosystem has its native CVL token — the amount of which will be limited to 100 million — that purports to provide financial sustainability and improve trust in journalism.

Starting March 6, users will purportedly be able to purchase Civil membership, including CVL which will represent members’ voting power within the Civil ecosystem. “Thirty-four million Civil tokens will be priced by The Civil Media Company at $0.20 per CVL on March 6. Every token sold will trigger a slight price increase until the last token goes for $0.94 via a transparent, fixed and linear slope,” the post reads.

The company will reportedly direct 100 percent of the net proceeds to independent non-profit organization Civil Foundation, that supports ethical journalism on a global scale. Apart from that, members will get an equivalent number of CVL to their financial contribution to the Civil Foundation.

Within the launch, Civil will introduce two tools — the Civil Registry and the Civil Publisher. The first is an app that enables any newsroom to apply to be a Civil newsroom with the self-governing community. The latter allows Civil newsrooms to index verifiable data about their publications to the blockchain. Nearly 100 newsrooms are reportedly signed on to join the platform.

Civil notes in the post that the recent development is not another “token sale,” likely referring to their ill-fated initial launch, when the CVL token sale targeting an $8 million minimum did not succeed last year. Civil reportedly raised only $1,435,491 in CVL tokens from 1,012 investors, while an additional 1,738 buyers registered for the sale, but never completed the transaction.

Last August, Civil entered into a content licensing partnership with the Associated Press (AP), in which the AP would deliver its content, including national and international news to Civil, so that news agencies can access it on the platform.